Made Up Campaign

http://madeupcampaign.com/

"MADE UP explores social constructions of gender differences, beauty, and relationships"

 I came across this campaign and it immediately caught my attention for several reasons. The first is that this experiment, in my opinion, not only challenges the idea of what is 'normal' and 'acceptable' in this society's idea of beauty for women but it also challenges the other side of that coin: that men cannot or should not present their exterior in a way that is deemed ' not masculine'. The second was the inclusion of the quotes from both the men and women in the experiment, these provided insight into those social norms that many men and women follow-sometimes unwillingly.

            An idea that I have found to be a thread throughout the photographs and quotes is that with or without makeup, some of the women felt uncomfortable. They felt that if they wore makeup, they would be perceived to be ‘trying too hard’ and if they didn’t wear makeup at all, they would feel vulnerable in having to face the judgmental public eye. In my own experience, I’ve dealt with this conflict of motivation; I always ask myself, “Why am I putting this on? Is it for me or for the people I’m going to see? Why do I feel more confident when my madeup face looks very different from my natural one?”  

            The other thread I found throughout the photographs was the idea that I constantly grapple with: men and masculinity, females and femininity. These social constructs that tend to affect interactions between the sexes was mentioned in the website, “I think girls [attract people] with their appearance, and guys-some guys do it with their appearance-but I think most guys do it with their actions. So they usually act like idiots or something to try and get the attention of a girl, and a girl would just stay quiet and mysterious and dress up or put on a lot of makeup or something like that”. There are a lot of things I see wrong with this statement in particular, but I think it’s an accurate depiction of typical social interactions. The most bothersome part is the idea that a woman is meant to stay quiet and be an object for viewing without having a place to actively participate in interactions.

            I could go on forever about why this experiment fascinates me, it touches on so many different topics but I think I’m going to leave it at that. I would really love for these photos to be presented to people of various age groups to see their reactions, I think that could be really telling of where we are as a society and where we are going in terms of gender relations and social constructs.